Review Blog

May 29 2015

You can't take an elephant on the bus by Patricia Cleveland-Peck

Ill. by David Tazzyman. Bloomsbury, 2015. ISBN 9781408849828
(Age: Junior primary) Recommended. Transport. Elephants. Size and
shape. London. With two odd looking creatures welcoming the reader
on the opening page, to an array of bus tickets for London Transport
on the title page, the readers know they will be highly entertained
by this fast moving verse story. Each animal represented has been
crowded into a most inappropriate mode of transport which will cause
gales of laughter from the readers and listeners. An elephant on a
bus, what next? Well try a monkey in a shopping trolley or a tiger
on a train, a camel in a sailing boat, and a taxi driven by a seal.
Each causes mayhem as the bus seat is squashed flat, the trolley
skidding out of control in the shopping aisles, the boat turned
upside down, and the taxi causing traffic chaos. Eleven animals are
shown with a mode of transport that will cause hilarity amongst the
readers, and the double page devoted to each is a delight to look
at.
The entertaining illustrations are wildly imaginative as each animal
is shown in its particular form of transport, delighting in the way
they are moving, but by the looks on their faces, aware that there
is some underlying concern. I loved the giraffe stuffed into the
plane and the hippo in the hot air balloon, while the bear and the
ice cream van is hilarious. Each page has lots of things to look at,
ponder and seek out, while the story lends itself to discussions
about forms of transport, size and shape as well as animals of the
world, and the verses will be read over and over again.
Fran Knight